Remember. Hindsight is always 20/20. Every time a probe crashes, a week later someone comes out with a detailed reason for exactly why it happened. Well, now when we find out what the problem is, they can implement a solution for the next probe and hopefully fix the problem in time to prevent a second crash.
just occurred to me (probably due to lack of sleep). Imagine that a service similar to internic was established (I could do it, I got a spare 486 around here somewhere) that acts as a root domain server. I point my nameserver at it to feed me addresses. The root nameserver will check its own databases first and if it doesn't find a match, it will then query the internic root domain servers. This would allow me to use microsoft.com or any other domain that has already been taken.
Obviously, this has limited use when there's only one person using it, but nobody is FORCED to use the primary internic root nameservers like everybody does. A nameserver could use ANY root nameserver it liked.
Lets say I run a small isp, something around the size of AOL. I set up my nameservers to use the alternate root nameserver (still using the 486 of course). Then I decide that I don't like microsoft (can't think of any reasons at the moment, but I'll worry about that later). I therefore "register" microsoft.com on my root nameserver and now all the 18 million users using my isp will see the NEW microsoft.com. Microsoft still owns microsoft.com. The original microsoft.com site is very much in the same place it always was. Every other user on the internet is able to access it directly. But not my users. My users see a glimmer of a gentler, kinder microsoft. Perhaps a microsoft that promotes linux.
Microsoft will eventually catch wind of this.... maybe one of their employees prefers my isp over MSN and notices that the microsoft homepage looks funny, and reports it. After several multimillion dollar lawsuits against internic, they'll eventually discover that all my users are not using internic, but a different name service provider. Microsoft is not pleased. They want microsoft.com.
But they already HAVE microsoft.com, and despite the fact that they are now in debt greater than the US government, internic insists they STILL have it. At least the lawyers are happy. Microsoft attempts to get us to fix our problem, but our name service provider doesn't conform to any federal regulation. Nobody is forced to use my service any more than a user is forced to use windows on a PC. Of course, my 18 million users might start leaving in droves if they discover that I've been deceiving them all along, but then again... an internet without Microsoft... worse things could happen.
Lets say that all the microsoft lawyers go on a 6 month vacation and therefore microsoft doesnt' press any legal agenda toward reclaiming their domain from us for a while. I decide to set up another top level domain (.mine) for my personal name service. This way, someone can access microsoft.com.mine to get to the microsoft.com that I provide from outside of my isp service. This means that everyone on the internet now can access my domains even if they don't want to use my name service exclusively. (Its starting to look as if I might have to upgrade that 486).
But why SHOULDN'T they use my name service over internic's? After all, its just as good. So I go out to IRC and spam everyone to change their nameservers to point to the new root name server instead of the internic one. A few might be unwilling, a few might be confused, but the great mass of users will jump at the chance. I can also send out a large number of emails to all the isp's to use my name service instead of internic's. Promote the advanced technology of the 486 over whatever it is that internic is using. Chances are, it won't be too much of a stretch. Once I have a significant portion of the internet using my root domain servers, microsoft will gradually disappear from the web, and nobody would be the wiser. Oh sure, the news will be blasting it out to everyone every hour of every day, but ILOVEYOU and MELISSA were able to spread despite massive news reports, so I can't see how it will make any difference.
Internic was established to provide a single source of name service and was regulated by the government (to some extent) to provide those names. However, I know of no law which forces me to use them as my root nameserver, nor do I know of any law that forces me to provide customers with internic root name server access.
I'm sure I'm missing some key points in trademark law which would bite me in the ass before I got too far with this. But someone with the time and the resources could pull this off on a small scale and get away with it for a while and depending on how the laws work wherever that company is..... it might be viable. But with only a single 486.... very VERY slow.
I had the author of this book as an instructor in one of my C/C++ classes in college. He got canned after only one semester.
The very first words out of his mouth on the first day of class was "C is dead, so there's no point in learning it." His book included a copy of gcc, but for some reason I can't recall, nobody could get it working and he had to hand out another version on floppies. We had to use HIS book as the textbook, but the student bookstore wouldn't stock it and Barnes&Nobel didn't order enough books, so some of us had to wait several weeks to get it.
He didn't pace himself properly and ran out of material at about halfway through the semester, so he spits out an addendum, which we also have to buy, so he can keep talking. Half the book is filled with conversations of this Susan person and none of it adds anything to the content of the book.
You'll love this one. The day we had our first test, which had errors on it, but thats a different story, he was SO paranoid that someone would try to smuggle out a copy of the test (why I can't completely figure out), that he insisted on searching everyone's backpacks as they left to make sure nobody stole a copy. The fact that we turned in our copy when we left didn't make any difference. He could also have done what other paranoid instructors do that don't want their students cheating (or stealing tests) and just leave our bags at the front of the room. OH but that might make sense or something.
That was the last day I went to that class. I just dropped it after that because I was so sick of it/him. Apparently the real kicker happened at the end of the semester. When it came time to fill out evaluation forms, he naturally got a REALLY bad review, and some stupid idiot in the administration decided to tell him that before he gave out the final exams. So he goes into class telling everyone that he heard about the review and decided to give everyone a REALLY hard final exam as revenge. Most students ended up failing the class or getting low passing grades as a result. The school ended up giving everyone who wanted an option to do a small project to correct the grade in the class.
Don't buy this book. Don't send this guy any money. I don't know if he's changed any over the years, but this book is a piece of trash and it will NOT be money well spent.
You have ecommerce sites. They sell (mostly) meatspace products which turn a profit. They make money, costs are covered. No problem.
You have the average personal homepage which doesn't make any money now and probably never will because it wasn't designed to. Nothing changes, no problem.
You have the megaconglomerate media services which rely on banner ads for revenue. If they lose too much money on the internet, maybe they'll be forced to make an economic decision to quit using the internet. I'm really crying over this. No problem.
It really doesn't matter if you CAN make money on the internet. The internet was not founded to serve commercial purposes. If a business can discover an honest way to use the internet to its economic advantage, great. If the scam artists and porn kings are making a killing, hey... there were always suckers in the world, its unlikely they'll die off very soon.
The biggest issue here is the seeming inability to sell information. I don't necessarily see this as a problem. 99% of the information out there has been provided on a completely voluntary basis. I provide a tidbit to the world, as do hundreds of millions of other people. Those tidbits add up to a great wealth of information.
If the cost to run a site gets too large, there will be a source of revenue available. It might not be as obvious as banner ads, but if you have a large number of eyeballs, you WILL be offered compensation. I run a relatively low volume website that gets at most about 20,000 hits a year and I have been offered several jobs for over $50,000/year. I consider that to be a revenue source. In fact, there may be other economic options that have not yet presented themselves in massive numbers. The internet of today barely resembles what it was a mere 5 years ago. The next 5 years could have even more dramatic implications.
Also, remember the basic rules of supply and demand. Wherever there is demand for something, there WILL be a product offered, and there will be competition. And it may very well not resemble anything we've experienced over the last 5, 10, 20, or 100 years. Look around you today, you can get computers for free, internet service for free, DSL for free, long distance phone service for free.
You can spend $100 on a computer, pop off the case and make a few minor changes and you've just quadrupled the value of the machine. Then the company that should be losing money like crazy over this, thinks it over and decides that this isn't a problem and figures it might make them even more money in the future. Imagine that.
These things are happening because the world is changing. For many years the world was, for all practical purposes, held back. Held back by governmental regulations, excessive taxes, etc. However, the internet found a new life and has literally redesigned the entire world economy in such a short period of time that the governements of the world have been having a really hard time even attempting to keep up with it.
Record companies never saw mp3's coming. Now they're screwed and the industry as a whole has been changed forever. They might attempt to recover to some extent, but by not looking ahead, and not paying attention to which way the wind was blowing, they lost their opportunity. And they're not the only ones. MANY businesses are having the same problem. You HAVE to adapt. And the internet is probably only the first step.
This really has nothing to do with making money off of your website. The internet's affect on the future is so much more complex than a simple profit for information served.
Actually, I believe that AOL'ers are the indirect cause of most of the spam we get. They're the ones most likely to jump at anything they read in spam, as many AOL'ers are newbies and not completely immunized against spam yet. For this reason, spammers can pull some degree of revenue, so it makes spam a viable economic option.
If it wasn't for the AOL'ers, there's a good chance that the amount of positive responses spammers got would be overwealmed by the negative impact and most spam would stop.
I get my dsl line through GTE and use a different ISP as my service provider. It was a bitch and a half to get working correctly, although its been nearly flawless since I got it going.
The big issue is that GTE and my ISP can't possibly isolate a problem without having a conference call to discuss it. GTE will check all their settings and everything will be correct. My ISP will check all their settings and everything will be correct. The fact that my ISP was using the wrong settings but thought they were right will not be discovered until the two companies talk. Of course, I need to be on the line at the same time to assure that whatever they're doing to fix it actually fixes it. Otherwise there's a 2 day long behind the scenes battle before telling me they fixed the problem, with no change in service.
This really isn't a big problem, as I said.. once it started working, it stayed working without additional assistance. But GTE isn't exactly well known for stability and I'm really shocked that it has worked as well as it has, and I can't help but worry that sometime in the future (before I move) they will do something silly to change all that and my stability so far will go down the drain and I will require lengthy phone conversations, lots of hold time during hours I normally sleep. Can't wait.
I know they're lurking in the shadows somewhere, ready to strike. Its only a matter of time, after all. People will only use this to make illegal copies of DVD's. There's no other purpose. Can't possibly be any other purpose.
There's a good chance that they're standing on shaky legal ground, but remember, there's also a chance that what they're doing is legal. It would be EXTREMELY stupid to risk a lot of money on a startup like this without at least having adaquate legal protection. Remember, the recording studios would probably justify this type of streaming if they got a fair chunk of the revenue, and its quite possible that this is what they're doing.
Of course, its possible that they're just stupid. Time will tell.
Granted, its not much better, but a step in the right direction. Just make sure you trademark it first.
Slightly off topic, Someone previously mentioned the possibility of a "for nerds" series. This leads to my 15 minutes of inspiration (before I figure that I'll never bother to spend the time doing it).....
The "for dummies" series of books attempts to take a complex subject and break it down into terms that the common layman MIGHT be able to comprehend. The "for nerds" series would do the opposite. Take a simple, familiar concept and elaborate it out to the point where it will drive most people insane. Something along the lines of a 100 page book on how to tie your shoes, with lots of scientific analysis and reference, and history, and methods, and training, and so on.
Of course, nobody in their right mind would ever read such a book, but it does bring up an interesting issue. Something new comes out that for some reason, we don't want anyone to use. We therefore publish many books and articles about the product that make it seem so complex that after reading 10 pages, the potential customer will give up all hope of ever trying to learn it.
Imagine this scenario. There exists someone somewhere who has not yet used a computer (this is just hypethetical..work with me here). He hears about the internet from his favorite source of information and decides he wants to get on it, so he looks to purchase a computer. Well, instead of rushing right down to the computer store to buy one, he decides he'll first attempt to read up on it.
He gets to the bookstore and finds a book about how to get on the internet, how to purchase a computer, what operating system to use, etc etc. This book will express in extremely easy to understand terms how to assemble a computer from scratch, but make the process of purchasing a computer from a salesman in a store seem like a nightmare (lots of references to Fry's could almost make this a reality), so the unknowing person would assume that its easier to build a computer from scratch, because he doesn't know any better.
Then it gets to the choice of operating systems. Make it extremely easy to install linux. But offer an alternative operating system for those who want more of a "challenge" and present them with the possibility of installing windows. Explain that the first downside of this option is that it will cost more, and the all windows, all the time concept of the operating system makes useful scripting extrememly difficult, but thats what our person wants, right , a challenge.
So he reads ahead a bit on the windows section, because he might have heard of microsoft before. Make the installation process seem like a royal pain in the ass. Make sure that if they attempt to walk through it, you take the absolute longest path possible. Make sure that they configure it in such a way that once the system is up and running, nothing will work right and they'll get constant error messages. And tell them that they should expect these messages on a regular basis while they use the operating system. Tell them that whenever the system locks up and a blue screen comes up, that means that many important files get deleted and the only solution to getting a blue screen is to reinstall the operating system from scratch, otherwise more blue screens will occur. The possibilities are endless, and of course, our reader will be so mortified of windows, he'll never even ATTEMPT to install it and assume that linux is really the best option, and will merrily start hacking away.
The world thrives on FUD. Microsoft uses it to say that linux is hard to install, or lacks applications, or doesn't have a multibillion dollor monopolistic empire behind it. And people believe it. And why wouldn't they, after all, someone wrote it or said it, so it MUST be true. So if they read somewhere that microsoft is difficult to install and use, with enough supporting "evidence", they might believe that too. Of course, the whole Microsoft/linux debate has gained too much public attention and has pretty much biased everyone so there are very few who haven't formed an opinion, one way or another.
This one has been predicted ever since Melissa was released. Now we have one that does something dangerous, but its still nowhere bad as it could be. Next time it won't use an easily parsed subject line. Next time it won't go around erasing random files, it will just wait until a certain date and just nuke the entire computer.
Of course, I don't use outlook. Maybe during the long recovery process, other people will start to realize the disadvantages of it as well.
Is it just me, or does that entire article just seem like a taunt? I mean, there's no actual meat to that article. It doesn't have any real point to make. It just comes across as an elaborate way of saying "You suck!", then the author stands back and watches what happens. If 3 people agree with him or thousands get out the flamethrowers, zdnet is raking in the revenue, because its anti-opensource and it appeared on slashdot.
As it has been said before, There are MANY MANY successful open source "products" that are in use today, and have been in use for several years now. Some of which, such as sendmail, predate even the earliest version of windows.
As for the hype factor, the difference between open source and every other dot-com company that hopes to rake in an obscene amount of money in an IPO, is that most of the time, open source projects are not started with such delusions of grandure. Nobody spends $200 million to hype the latest release of the linux kernel. For the most part, open source projects are focused solely for those that might find them useful and if nobody else is interested, the authors probably couldn't care less. Hype isn't even a factor.
Face it.. Its just a taunt. Please react appropriately.
This time, as many people as possible need to try to obtain a copy of the database, then hoarde it. Nobody else should try to run a competing service, that wouldn't make a whole lot of sense in this case, but if thousands of people have backups of the database, then in the event that this site gets shut down for whatever reason, another one can pop up in another location with no delay and right where the other one left off.
Not related to telemarketing, but an idea for filtering spam. Whenever you post a message, just use your normal email address. But also spread around a junk email address with specific instructions to not send any email to it, because it will never get read. Of course, spammers won't get that message and send you mail anyways. Now, unless someone is extremely stupid, the ONLY mail you should ever get to that junk email address is spam.
Write a filter that takes each message from the junk list and compares it to messages as they're recieved by your good address. If they match, then kill the message before you ever read it. It won't kill all spam at once, but should significantly whittle down the amount you have to end up reading.
I used to have problems with telemarketers, but not any longer. I have caller id. I won't answer any calls that show up anonymous, unavailable, or a company name I'm not familiar with. I just let my answering machine screen those calls. Most telemarketers won't bother to leave a message, so that solves that problem. If its someone important, well, they'll leave a message or it wasn't really all that important, now was it?
In fact, telemarketers can be fun sometimes if you have some time to kill. I always have a good day when I know that I've tied a telemarketer up on the phone for 30 minutes to an hour, and end up not buying anything. They tend to work off of commission, so keep them on the phone by really racking up a nice bill.
When I was in college and got my first credit cards, I got MANY MANY calls for additional services on my cards. One lady who called had the most obnoxious voice, and was trying to sell me some type of travel package. I kept her on the phone for 2 hours asking her obscure questions that her prepared scripts didn't answer and kept her constantly going back to her supervisor for assistance, all the while I kept conferencing my friends in on the phone call because it was so damn funny.
Just remember, do whatever you can to demoralize them, keep their spirits down, convince them to pursue a more respectable line of work. Telemarketers are usually people with no appreciable skills (they do read prepared scripts, after all) who get lured in by the money. Their only saving grace is that for every 20 people that hang up on them, there awaits a sucker who will slurp up everything they're selling. Just make sure that isn't enough for them to keep their job.:)
Damn. Nice idea. I want to build one now too.:) 25' tall is gonna be a bit difficult to handle. I can see one of these things running down the freeway at 120 mph, but it wouldn't be able to clear the bridges.
Still, I'd love to see the cops trying to call that one in.:)
A full scale, operational model of ED209 would be nice to have sitting in my front yard tho.
The reason they are so overvalued is because many investors missed the boat when microsoft grew from humble beginnings to an empire in a short period of time and anytime something comes along that might do the same thing, they want in on it while the prices are still good. "good" may very well mean 100x what the company is currently worth, but if these companies do take a strong foothold in the future of software development and OS placement over the next 10 years, the outrageous prices we see today might be more than justified in a few short years.
So the prices dropped. It happens. The higher the market goes, the more its likely to drop in a day. This is not unusual. There have been may 500+ point drops in the last few years, and all of them have recovered quickly. Remember another thing, almost all the activity on friday was based solely on "predicted information", and if that information does not pan out, the market will boom once again. And even if it does pan out, the market will boom again anyways. The market is a strange beast. Its almost impossible to predict. Its a huge poker game, if you got the guts, feel free to play.
When are these console companies going to realize that modems are quickly turning into a technology that serves only those that have no other choice. DSL and cable, and who knows what else in the next couple years are available to an increasingly massive proportion of the public. Ethernet is really the only option that makes sense for these situations, and it would make a lot of sense for console designers to add it in.
Ethernet is a proven technology. The last network card I bought consisted of ONE chip and a couple capacitors. Its not a big deal to add network support to almost any architecture anymore. Perhaps not every potential customer has a home network yet, but this is quickly changing. This is another prime example of a company not embracing the future. The iOpener is another perfect example. Hardware hackers made it obvious real quick how much they fell short of what people really want.. Just wait until someone ports linux to the PS2.
Selling land on the moon may be legal, meaning that the government can't prosecute anyone for selling it, nor can you sue someone because they sold it to you, since it was a legal sale.
That being said, you have no protection for your property rights. Anyone else could waltz along, claim your land, and there's nothing you'd be able to do about it. Why? In most of the countries on Earth where owning property is legal, the state/government will protect your ownership rights to that property. Nobody will protect such rights on the moon, except perhaps for you.
It will be interesting to see what happens when people start colonizing the moon in massive numbers. The moon's population will eventually reach a critical mass where people start fighting over who owns what, and which countires hold which claims, and the revolutionairy wars will start all over again.
If a website does not want any outsiders linking to any page other than the main page, this CAN be prevented. The webserver knows the referring webpage and can therefore refuse any request from any source other than an internal page or a trusted site. All that is required is a little CGI work (if that even), and the problem is completely solved.
Of course, instead of spending a few hours to properly configure a website, they'd rather make a legal issue out of it. Seems to be the trend these days.
Get the movie at: ftp://ftp.alignment.net/pub/lotr_640l.mov
People have actually SEEN the preview, so there's a good chance a mirror isn't really necessary. But slashdot effects happen, the world is an imperfect place.
I am a power user. I like my life very much the way it is right now.:)
I got an adsl line through GTE a month ago, and once they got their collective heads out of their asses and got the service properly set up and connected, its worked flawlessly ever since. My service provides 1.544mbps down and 768kbps up and I have been able to see those speeds with no problem, although usually I have to have multiple transfers going to get total rate since it seems that most systems can't push the maximum I can download at.:)
As for his comment about nobody ever needing to use that much bandwidth for any significant length of time, I've been burning 5-10 cdr's per day of stuff since I got it installed. Sure, I'll probably tone it down eventually... like when I can't find anything else to grab. In fact, the biggest problem right now is constantly running out of HD space, since I only have a 2x cdrom burner at the moment and its FAR too slow.
Another thing to consider. I'm still using a 10base2 coax based network, which until I installed the dsl worked GREAT. Now I easily see the limitations of 10mbps ethernet. Downloading at 1.5mbps through one computer and saving files on another, then copying those files to yet another computer to burn them, and probalby moving them between computers at least one more time in between in a desparate effort to clear up some space where it is needed.... suddenly you're at capacity. And packet collisions become much more frequent when you're copying files from two different locations at the same time, downloading, plus trying to watch a movie over the network.
I plan to install 100mbps as soon as I possibly can.:)
-Restil A power user having too much fun with his toys to bother with a new life right now.:)
I don't know exactly his reasons for leaving, but I would imagine it has quite a lot to do with how his company has fared the last few years. Up through Ultima 7, things were great. But after that, they just sold out. They decided to give up on their core fans and deliver a more appealing product to the greatest common denominator, and bombed badly with Ultima 8. Not to be outdone, they released a buggy, untested, unbalanced Ultima Online, where they went out of their way to cater to the cheaters and the whiners, and destroyed the game for everyone who actually tried to play within its rules, unbalanced as they may be.
Ultima used to be a great series, rich in story. It had morals to teach, where even in the earlier games it would present them in a subtle way. Ultima 5 was my favorite. Ultima 7 was a close second.
It had(has) a loyal following of people who dedicate thousands of hours to promoting the game, writing fan fiction, etc because they love the story behind the game. All for naught it would seem the last few years. Its a shame really.
I'd imagine he left out of disgust. Whatever he had tried to create was destroyed by those he had to answer to. U9 suffered greatly because of marketing issues. Instead of releasing a game quickly based on a tried and true perspective which everyone was sure to love, and inserting a deep, well thought out story... they wasted their time on the graphics, they killed off the story completely and the creator has left, almost guaranteeing that its dead forever.
Thank you Origin/EA. Thank you for reminding me the way the world really is. I grow up with you guiding me, and now that I'm older I see you for what you really are. Should I be bitter? Nah. It was fun while it lasted. Its just too bad it couldn't last longer.
Slashdot Mirror
Remember. Hindsight is always 20/20. Every time a probe crashes, a week later someone comes out with a detailed reason for exactly why it happened. Well, now when we find out what the problem is, they can implement a solution for the next probe and hopefully fix the problem in time to prevent a second crash.
-Restil
just occurred to me (probably due to lack of sleep). Imagine that a service similar to internic was established (I could do it, I got a spare 486 around here somewhere) that acts as a root domain server. I point my nameserver at it to feed me addresses. The root nameserver will check its own databases first and if it doesn't find a match, it will then query the internic root domain servers. This would allow me to use microsoft.com or any other domain that has already been taken.
Obviously, this has limited use when there's only one person using it, but nobody is FORCED to use the primary internic root nameservers like everybody does. A nameserver could use ANY root nameserver it liked.
Lets say I run a small isp, something around the size of AOL. I set up my nameservers to use the alternate root nameserver (still using the 486 of course). Then I decide that I don't like microsoft (can't think of any reasons at the moment, but I'll worry about that later). I therefore "register" microsoft.com on my root nameserver and now all the 18 million users using my isp will see the NEW microsoft.com. Microsoft still owns microsoft.com. The original microsoft.com site is very much in the same place it always was. Every other user on the internet is able to access it directly. But not my users. My users see a glimmer of a gentler, kinder microsoft. Perhaps a microsoft that promotes linux.
Microsoft will eventually catch wind of this.... maybe one of their employees prefers my isp over MSN and notices that the microsoft homepage looks funny, and reports it. After several multimillion dollar lawsuits against internic, they'll eventually discover that all my users are not using internic, but a different name service provider. Microsoft is not pleased. They want microsoft.com.
But they already HAVE microsoft.com, and despite the fact that they are now in debt greater than the US government, internic insists they STILL have it. At least the lawyers are happy. Microsoft attempts to get us to fix our problem, but our name service provider doesn't conform to any federal regulation. Nobody is forced to use my service any more than a user is forced to use windows on a PC. Of course, my 18 million users might start leaving in droves if they discover that I've been deceiving them all along, but then again... an internet without Microsoft... worse things could happen.
Lets say that all the microsoft lawyers go on a 6 month vacation and therefore microsoft doesnt' press any legal agenda toward reclaiming their domain from us for a while. I decide to set up another top level domain (.mine) for my personal name service. This way, someone can access microsoft.com.mine to get to the microsoft.com that I provide from outside of my isp service. This means that everyone on the internet now can access my domains even if they don't want to use my name service exclusively. (Its starting to look as if I might have to upgrade that 486).
But why SHOULDN'T they use my name service over internic's? After all, its just as good. So I go out to IRC and spam everyone to change their nameservers to point to the new root name server instead of the internic one. A few might be unwilling, a few might be confused, but the great mass of users will jump at the chance. I can also send out a large number of emails to all the isp's to use my name service instead of internic's. Promote the advanced technology of the 486 over whatever it is that internic is using. Chances are, it won't be too much of a stretch. Once I have a significant portion of the internet using my root domain servers, microsoft will gradually disappear from the web, and nobody would be the wiser. Oh sure, the news will be blasting it out to everyone every hour of every day, but ILOVEYOU and MELISSA were able to spread despite massive news reports, so I can't see how it will make any difference.
Internic was established to provide a single source of name service and was regulated by the government (to some extent) to provide those names. However, I know of no law which forces me to use them as my root nameserver, nor do I know of any law that forces me to provide customers with internic root name server access.
I'm sure I'm missing some key points in trademark law which would bite me in the ass before I got too far with this. But someone with the time and the resources could pull this off on a small scale and get away with it for a while and depending on how the laws work wherever that company is..... it might be viable. But with only a single 486.... very VERY slow.
-Restil
I had the author of this book as an instructor in one of my C/C++ classes in college. He got canned after only one semester.
The very first words out of his mouth on the first day of class was "C is dead, so there's no point in learning it." His book included a copy of gcc, but for some reason I can't recall, nobody could get it working and he had to hand out another version on floppies. We had to use HIS book as the textbook, but the student bookstore wouldn't stock it and Barnes&Nobel didn't order enough books, so some of us had to wait several weeks to get it.
He didn't pace himself properly and ran out of material at about halfway through the semester, so he spits out an addendum, which we also have to buy, so he can keep talking. Half the book is filled with conversations of this Susan person and none of it adds anything to the content of the book.
You'll love this one. The day we had our first test, which had errors on it, but thats a different story, he was SO paranoid that someone would try to smuggle out a copy of the test (why I can't completely figure out), that he insisted on searching everyone's backpacks as they left to make sure nobody stole a copy. The fact that we turned in our copy when we left didn't make any difference. He could also have done what other paranoid instructors do that don't want their students cheating (or stealing tests) and just leave our bags at the front of the room. OH but that might make sense or something.
That was the last day I went to that class. I just dropped it after that because I was so sick of it/him. Apparently the real kicker happened at the end of the semester. When it came time to fill out evaluation forms, he naturally got a REALLY bad review, and some stupid idiot in the administration decided to tell him that before he gave out the final exams. So he goes into class telling everyone that he heard about the review and decided to give everyone a REALLY hard final exam as revenge. Most students ended up failing the class or getting low passing grades as a result. The school ended up giving everyone who wanted an option to do a small project to correct the grade in the class.
Don't buy this book. Don't send this guy any money. I don't know if he's changed any over the years, but this book is a piece of trash and it will NOT be money well spent.
-Restil
You have ecommerce sites. They sell (mostly) meatspace products which turn a profit. They make money, costs are covered. No problem.
You have the average personal homepage which doesn't make any money now and probably never will because it wasn't designed to. Nothing changes, no problem.
You have the megaconglomerate media services which rely on banner ads for revenue. If they lose too much money on the internet, maybe they'll be forced to make an economic decision to quit using the internet. I'm really crying over this. No problem.
It really doesn't matter if you CAN make money on the internet. The internet was not founded to serve commercial purposes. If a business can discover an honest way to use the internet to its economic advantage, great. If the scam artists and porn kings are making a killing, hey... there were always suckers in the world, its unlikely they'll die off very soon.
The biggest issue here is the seeming inability to sell information. I don't necessarily see this as a problem. 99% of the information out there has been provided on a completely voluntary basis. I provide a tidbit to the world, as do hundreds of millions of other people. Those tidbits add up to a great wealth of information.
If the cost to run a site gets too large, there will be a source of revenue available. It might not be as obvious as banner ads, but if you have a large number of eyeballs, you WILL be offered compensation. I run a relatively low volume website that gets at most about 20,000 hits a year and I have been offered several jobs for over $50,000/year. I consider that to be a revenue source. In fact, there may be other economic options that have not yet presented themselves in massive numbers. The internet of today barely resembles what it was a mere 5 years ago. The next 5 years could have even more dramatic implications.
Also, remember the basic rules of supply and demand. Wherever there is demand for something, there WILL be a product offered, and there will be competition. And it may very well not resemble anything we've experienced over the last 5, 10, 20, or 100 years. Look around you today, you can get computers for free, internet service for free, DSL for free, long distance phone service for free.
You can spend $100 on a computer, pop off the case and make a few minor changes and you've just quadrupled the value of the machine. Then the company that should be losing money like crazy over this, thinks it over and decides that this isn't a problem and figures it might make them even more money in the future. Imagine that.
These things are happening because the world is changing. For many years the world was, for all practical purposes, held back. Held back by governmental regulations, excessive taxes, etc. However, the internet found a new life and has literally redesigned the entire world economy in such a short period of time that the governements of the world have been having a really hard time even attempting to keep up with it.
Record companies never saw mp3's coming. Now they're screwed and the industry as a whole has been changed forever. They might attempt to recover to some extent, but by not looking ahead, and not paying attention to which way the wind was blowing, they lost their opportunity. And they're not the only ones. MANY businesses are having the same problem. You HAVE to adapt. And the internet is probably only the first step.
This really has nothing to do with making money off of your website. The internet's affect on the future is so much more complex than a simple profit for information served.
-Restil
Actually, I believe that AOL'ers are the indirect cause of most of the spam we get. They're the ones most likely to jump at anything they read in spam, as many AOL'ers are newbies and not completely immunized against spam yet. For this reason, spammers can pull some degree of revenue, so it makes spam a viable economic option.
If it wasn't for the AOL'ers, there's a good chance that the amount of positive responses spammers got would be overwealmed by the negative impact and most spam would stop.
Just my opinion anyways.
-Restil
I get my dsl line through GTE and use a different ISP as my service provider. It was a bitch and a half to get working correctly, although its been nearly flawless since I got it going.
The big issue is that GTE and my ISP can't possibly isolate a problem without having a conference call to discuss it. GTE will check all their settings and everything will be correct. My ISP will check all their settings and everything will be correct. The fact that my ISP was using the wrong settings but thought they were right will not be discovered until the two companies talk. Of course, I need to be on the line at the same time to assure that whatever they're doing to fix it actually fixes it. Otherwise there's a 2 day long behind the scenes battle before telling me they fixed the problem, with no change in service.
This really isn't a big problem, as I said.. once it started working, it stayed working without additional assistance. But GTE isn't exactly well known for stability and I'm really shocked that it has worked as well as it has, and I can't help but worry that sometime in the future (before I move) they will do something silly to change all that and my stability so far will go down the drain and I will require lengthy phone conversations, lots of hold time during hours I normally sleep. Can't wait.
-Restil
I know they're lurking in the shadows somewhere, ready to strike. Its only a matter of time, after all. People will only use this to make illegal copies of DVD's. There's no other purpose. Can't possibly be any other purpose.
:)
-Restil
There's a good chance that they're standing on shaky legal ground, but remember, there's also a chance that what they're doing is legal. It would be EXTREMELY stupid to risk a lot of money on a startup like this without at least having adaquate legal protection. Remember, the recording studios would probably justify this type of streaming if they got a fair chunk of the revenue, and its quite possible that this is what they're doing.
Of course, its possible that they're just stupid. Time will tell.
-Restil
If I recall correctly, the issue was not with QT, but with KDE for using it.
Use: for moronic losers
Granted, its not much better, but a step in the right direction. Just make sure you trademark it first.
Slightly off topic, Someone previously mentioned the possibility of a "for nerds" series. This leads to my 15 minutes of inspiration (before I figure that I'll never bother to spend the time doing it).....
The "for dummies" series of books attempts to take a complex subject and break it down into terms that the common layman MIGHT be able to comprehend. The "for nerds" series would do the opposite. Take a simple, familiar concept and elaborate it out to the point where it will drive most people insane. Something along the lines of a 100 page book on how to tie your shoes, with lots of scientific analysis and reference, and history, and methods, and training, and so on.
Of course, nobody in their right mind would ever read such a book, but it does bring up an interesting issue. Something new comes out that for some reason, we don't want anyone to use. We therefore publish many books and articles about the product that make it seem so complex that after reading 10 pages, the potential customer will give up all hope of ever trying to learn it.
Imagine this scenario. There exists someone somewhere who has not yet used a computer (this is just hypethetical..work with me here). He hears about the internet from his favorite source of information and decides he wants to get on it, so he looks to purchase a computer. Well, instead of rushing right down to the computer store to buy one, he decides he'll first attempt to read up on it.
He gets to the bookstore and finds a book about how to get on the internet, how to purchase a computer, what operating system to use, etc etc. This book will express in extremely easy to understand terms how to assemble a computer from scratch, but make the process of purchasing a computer from a salesman in a store seem like a nightmare (lots of references to Fry's could almost make this a reality), so the unknowing person would assume that its easier to build a computer from scratch, because he doesn't know any better.
Then it gets to the choice of operating systems. Make it extremely easy to install linux. But offer an alternative operating system for those who want more of a "challenge" and present them with the possibility of installing windows. Explain that the first downside of this option is that it will cost more, and the all windows, all the time concept of the operating system makes useful scripting extrememly difficult, but thats what our person wants, right , a challenge.
So he reads ahead a bit on the windows section, because he might have heard of microsoft before. Make the installation process seem like a royal pain in the ass. Make sure that if they attempt to walk through it, you take the absolute longest path possible. Make sure that they configure it in such a way that once the system is up and running, nothing will work right and they'll get constant error messages. And tell them that they should expect these messages on a regular basis while they use the operating system. Tell them that whenever the system locks up and a blue screen comes up, that means that many important files get deleted and the only solution to getting a blue screen is to reinstall the operating system from scratch, otherwise more blue screens will occur. The possibilities are endless, and of course, our reader will be so mortified of windows, he'll never even ATTEMPT to install it and assume that linux is really the best option, and will merrily start hacking away.
The world thrives on FUD. Microsoft uses it to say that linux is hard to install, or lacks applications, or doesn't have a multibillion dollor monopolistic empire behind it. And people believe it. And why wouldn't they, after all, someone wrote it or said it, so it MUST be true. So if they read somewhere that microsoft is difficult to install and use, with enough supporting "evidence", they might believe that too. Of course, the whole Microsoft/linux debate has gained too much public attention and has pretty much biased everyone so there are very few who haven't formed an opinion, one way or another.
-Restil
All of that, and you didn't even claim first post. :)
Get with the program!
-Restil
This one has been predicted ever since Melissa was released. Now we have one that does something dangerous, but its still nowhere bad as it could be. Next time it won't use an easily parsed subject line. Next time it won't go around erasing random files, it will just wait until a certain date and just nuke the entire computer.
Of course, I don't use outlook. Maybe during the long recovery process, other people will start to realize the disadvantages of it as well.
-Restil
Strange though it might sound, I can actually see where a game could be made based on that plotline. Like Laura Bow with a Scream like twist.
I probably wouldn't play it, but it might appeal to someone.
-Restil
Is it just me, or does that entire article just seem like a taunt? I mean, there's no actual meat to that article. It doesn't have any real point to make. It just comes across as an elaborate way of saying "You suck!", then the author stands back and watches what happens. If 3 people agree with him or thousands get out the flamethrowers, zdnet is raking in the revenue, because its anti-opensource and it appeared on slashdot.
As it has been said before, There are MANY MANY successful open source "products" that are in use today, and have been in use for several years now. Some of which, such as sendmail, predate even the earliest version of windows.
As for the hype factor, the difference between open source and every other dot-com company that hopes to rake in an obscene amount of money in an IPO, is that most of the time, open source projects are not started with such delusions of grandure. Nobody spends $200 million to hype the latest release of the linux kernel. For the most part, open source projects are focused solely for those that might find them useful and if nobody else is interested, the authors probably couldn't care less. Hype isn't even a factor.
Face it.. Its just a taunt. Please react appropriately.
-Restil
This time, as many people as possible need to try to obtain a copy of the database, then hoarde it. Nobody else should try to run a competing service, that wouldn't make a whole lot of sense in this case, but if thousands of people have backups of the database, then in the event that this site gets shut down for whatever reason, another one can pop up in another location with no delay and right where the other one left off.
-Restil
Not related to telemarketing, but an idea for filtering spam. Whenever you post a message, just use your normal email address. But also spread around a junk email address with specific instructions to not send any email to it, because it will never get read. Of course, spammers won't get that message and send you mail anyways. Now, unless someone is extremely stupid, the ONLY mail you should ever get to that junk email address is spam.
Write a filter that takes each message from the junk list and compares it to messages as they're recieved by your good address. If they match, then kill the message before you ever read it.
It won't kill all spam at once, but should significantly whittle down the amount you have to end up reading.
-Restil
I used to have problems with telemarketers, but
:)
not any longer. I have caller id. I won't answer any calls that show up anonymous, unavailable, or a company name I'm not familiar with. I just let my answering machine screen those calls. Most telemarketers won't bother to leave a message, so that solves that problem. If its someone important, well, they'll leave a message or it wasn't really all that important, now was it?
In fact, telemarketers can be fun sometimes if you have some time to kill. I always have a good day when I know that I've tied a telemarketer up on the phone for 30 minutes to an hour, and end up not buying anything. They tend to work off of commission, so keep them on the phone by really racking up a nice bill.
When I was in college and got my first credit cards, I got MANY MANY calls for additional services on my cards. One lady who called had the most obnoxious voice, and was trying to sell me some type of travel package. I kept her on the phone for 2 hours asking her obscure questions that her prepared scripts didn't answer and kept her constantly going back to her supervisor for assistance, all the while I kept conferencing my friends in on the phone call because it was so damn funny.
Just remember, do whatever you can to demoralize them, keep their spirits down, convince them to pursue a more respectable line of work. Telemarketers are usually people with no appreciable skills (they do read prepared scripts, after all) who get lured in by the money. Their only saving grace is that for every 20 people that hang up on them, there awaits a sucker who will slurp up everything they're selling. Just make sure that isn't enough for them to keep their job.
-Restil
Damn. Nice idea. I want to build one now too. :)
:)
25' tall is gonna be a bit difficult to handle. I can see one of these things running down the freeway at 120 mph, but it wouldn't be able to clear the bridges.
Still, I'd love to see the cops trying to call that one in.
A full scale, operational model of ED209 would be nice to have sitting in my front yard tho.
-Restil
The reason they are so overvalued is because many investors missed the boat when microsoft grew from humble beginnings to an empire in a short period of time and anytime something comes along that might do the same thing, they want in on it while the prices are still good. "good" may very well mean 100x what the company is currently worth, but if these companies do take a strong foothold in the future of software development and OS placement over the next 10 years, the outrageous prices we see today might be more than justified in a few short years.
So the prices dropped. It happens. The higher the market goes, the more its likely to drop in a day. This is not unusual. There have been may 500+ point drops in the last few years, and all of them have recovered quickly. Remember another thing, almost all the activity on friday was based solely on "predicted information", and if that information does not pan out, the market will boom once again. And even if it does pan out, the market will boom again anyways. The market is a strange beast. Its almost impossible to predict. Its a huge poker game, if you got the guts, feel free to play.
-Restil
When are these console companies going to realize that modems are quickly turning into a technology that serves only those that have no other choice. DSL and cable, and who knows what else in the next couple years are available to an increasingly massive proportion of the public. Ethernet is really the only option that makes sense for these situations, and it would make a lot of sense for console designers to add it in.
Ethernet is a proven technology. The last network card I bought consisted of ONE chip and a couple capacitors. Its not a big deal to add network support to almost any architecture anymore. Perhaps not every potential customer has a home network yet, but this is quickly changing. This is another prime example of a company not embracing the future. The iOpener is another perfect example. Hardware hackers made it obvious real quick how much they fell short of what people really want.. Just wait until someone ports linux to the PS2.
-Restil
Selling land on the moon may be legal, meaning that the government can't prosecute anyone for selling it, nor can you sue someone because they sold it to you, since it was a legal sale.
That being said, you have no protection for your property rights. Anyone else could waltz along, claim your land, and there's nothing you'd be able to do about it. Why? In most of the countries on Earth where owning property is legal, the state/government will protect your ownership rights to that property. Nobody will protect such rights on the moon, except perhaps for you.
It will be interesting to see what happens when people start colonizing the moon in massive numbers. The moon's population will eventually reach a critical mass where people start fighting over who owns what, and which countires hold which claims, and the revolutionairy wars will start all over again.
-Restil
If a website does not want any outsiders linking to any page other than the main page, this CAN be prevented. The webserver knows the referring webpage and can therefore refuse any request from any source other than an internal page or a trusted site. All that is required is a little CGI work (if that even), and the problem is completely solved.
Of course, instead of spending a few hours to properly configure a website, they'd rather make a legal issue out of it. Seems to be the trend these days.
-Restil
Get the movie at:
:)
ftp://ftp.alignment.net/pub/lotr_640l.mov
People have actually SEEN the preview, so there's a good chance a mirror isn't really necessary. But slashdot effects happen, the world is an imperfect place.
Besides, I might be faster. Who knows.
-Restil
I am a power user. I like my life very much the way it is right now. :)
:)
:)
:)
I got an adsl line through GTE a month ago, and once they got their collective heads out of their asses and got the service properly set up and connected, its worked flawlessly ever since. My service provides 1.544mbps down and 768kbps up and I have been able to see those speeds with no problem, although usually I have to have multiple transfers going to get total rate since it seems that most systems can't push the maximum I can download at.
As for his comment about nobody ever needing to use that much bandwidth for any significant length of time, I've been burning 5-10 cdr's per day of stuff since I got it installed. Sure, I'll probably tone it down eventually... like when I can't find anything else to grab. In fact, the
biggest problem right now is constantly running out of HD space, since I only have a 2x cdrom burner at the moment and its FAR too slow.
Another thing to consider. I'm still using a 10base2 coax based network, which until I installed the dsl worked GREAT. Now I easily see the limitations of 10mbps ethernet. Downloading at 1.5mbps through one computer and saving files on another, then copying those files to yet another computer to burn them, and probalby moving them between computers at least one more time in between in a desparate effort to clear up some space where it is needed.... suddenly you're at
capacity. And packet collisions become much more frequent when you're copying files from two different locations at the same time, downloading, plus trying to watch a movie over the network.
I plan to install 100mbps as soon as I possibly can.
-Restil
A power user having too much fun with his toys to bother with a new life right now.
I don't know exactly his reasons for leaving, but I would imagine it has quite a lot to do with how his company has fared the last few years. Up through Ultima 7, things were great. But after that, they just sold out. They decided to give up on their core fans and deliver a more appealing product to the greatest common denominator, and bombed badly with Ultima 8. Not to be outdone, they released a buggy, untested, unbalanced Ultima Online, where they went out of their way to cater to the cheaters and the whiners, and destroyed the game for everyone who actually tried to play within its rules, unbalanced as they may be.
Ultima used to be a great series, rich in story. It had morals to teach, where even in the earlier games it would present them in a subtle way. Ultima 5 was my favorite. Ultima 7 was a close second.
It had(has) a loyal following of people who dedicate thousands of hours to promoting the game, writing fan fiction, etc because they love the story behind the game. All for naught it would seem the last few years. Its a shame really.
I'd imagine he left out of disgust. Whatever he had tried to create was destroyed by those he had to answer to. U9 suffered greatly because of marketing issues. Instead of releasing a game quickly based on a tried and true perspective which everyone was sure to love, and inserting a deep, well thought out story... they wasted their time on the graphics, they killed off the story completely and the creator has left, almost guaranteeing that its dead forever.
Thank you Origin/EA. Thank you for reminding me the way the world really is. I grow up with you guiding me, and now that I'm older I see you for what you really are. Should I be bitter? Nah. It was fun while it lasted. Its just too bad it couldn't last longer.
-Restil